Negative comments can hurt us, especially when we fear they might be true. So let's explore how to handle this, especially during family gatherings this holiday season.
Welcome to part 2 of our series dealing with other people's opinions. Today, we're gonna focus on why some of these negative comments sting a little bit more than others and what we might be able to do about it. Now remember, it's always an option to just let other people's comments go in one ear and out the other, absolutely an option. We can always tell them to keep their opinions to themselves, always an option.
What I wanted to talk about today is helping us understand why we might feel a little bit more sometimes when we hear these comments and from more of a base level, change our response to them.
The reason negative comments can be so hurtful is because part of us as saying they're true. We talked a little about this last time. If we are constantly saying mean things to ourselves, negative comments to ourselves, and we hear that reflected from someone else, it hurts because we have been telling ourselves that already. We think there is some truth to that.
Even if we've been losing weight or our weight's been the same or we don't care about our weight, If we have been thinking in the back of our minds, or in the front of our minds, we're telling it to ourselves every day that our weight is a problem, and someone else says that, we are going to have the potential to go down one of these negative spirals because we think it's true. So what I want to do is teach you a little algorithm to go down to see if we even need to acknowledge this comment. Can we just let it go in one ear and out the other?
The first thing we need to do is, did we even hear the comment? Is this something that we think someone is saying? Do we think we heard this through someone else? Or is this a comment that someone actually said to our face?
If we didn't hear it with our own ears, if someone didn't say it to us directly, we need to not think about it anymore. There's no proof it actually happened and we have just as much evidence that it didn't happen as it did happen, so let's just forget that one. Let's let it go.
So let's assume we did hear a comment with our own ears. Do we know this person? Was this some stranger on the street telling us we got a thick butt. I don't know. Whatever someone on the street would say. Do we even know them? If we heard it, but we don't really know them, who cares what they said? Let's pretend they're crazy. I don't know. Or they were talking to someone else. Pretend whatever you want or just forget about it. Let it go in one ear and out the other.
Let's assume we do know this person. The next thing we ask ourselves is do we care about this particular person's opinion? So if this is a comment at a family gathering that some distant cousin that we see once every 5 years said, do we care? I wouldn't think so. If we don't really know this person, maybe they're related to us in some obscure way that we need a chart to figure out. Maybe we just don't care about their opinion and we can let that one go too.
But let's say we've made it down, we heard it with our own ears, we know the person and we do care about their opinion. Is what they said valuable? Are they just making an off-handed comment that has no value. We can let those go too, but let's say it was valuable.
Let's say we do care about their opinion. We know them and we heard it. What do we do now? The key is to look in the mirror and decide if we think that's true and is it something we want to keep thinking is true? So if we've had a lot of negative self-talk and someone says something negative, we might think it's true, but if we're already working to change our self-concept, we're already working to change that thought on our own, we can probably just stop right there. We probably don't need to think about it anymore.
If someone says something about our weight and we're working on our weight, maybe we can just let that one go. If we've gotten down the whole algorithm and it's a new thought and it's not something we've already been beating ourselves up about, but we think there's a shred of truth to it. We get to look at that and decide, is that something I wanna change?
So if someone came up to me at a family gathering and said, Stacy, It really seems like you just don't like anybody. I do not think that that's true about myself. So that is a comment that I would probably need to look in the mirror and see if there's any shred of truth to that. And if I do think there's a shred of truth, is that is that something that I want to be true about myself? Do I want to be a person that doesn't like other people? Do I want people to interpret that about me, do I want to give off that vibe? Maybe not. Maybe I do. I don't know. Probably not, because I do identify as someone who's pretty friendly.
So that might be something I want to, out of curiosity, ask more questions about, like, oh, uncle, why do you think that about me? What are you saying that I'm not seeing? Out of curiosity, not from a place of feeling that I need to defend myself, but truly curious. I've checked in with myself. I don't think that's true. I'm interested why you think that's true and maybe we have a discussion about it. If it's something we're already working on or we don't think it's true, we can also let that go.
It can be challenging. I do challenge you to have some compassion depending on who's saying these negative comments to you. Most of our older relatives were Born in a time that they had a lot of social programming about their body appearance, about their weight, and they might think that they're trying to help. We can hold that against them or try and find a place of compassion for that. I think we have a lot of societal programming about what our bodies should look like and how women should behave. And to think that it was so much worse for our parents. I can appreciate sometimes that they speak out of line because that's all they knew. Like, if you weren't a thin attractive woman, like, be gone with you, 50 years ago. Right? So it makes sense that they would feel like they're helping by pointing out what is wrong with us so that we can maybe make it better. It is misguided and we don't need it, but I don't think most of the time they're trying to be malicious.
Now I sometimes find it helpful to have some compassionate thoughts that are kind of funny and quippy that will take away some of the sting when older people in my family might say things, such as poor thing thinks she's helping, must have been hard for her to grow up like that. And then you can always pull out the good old Southern, bless her heart, and move on. If we prepare ourselves mentally before these events and have some of these responses that spur compassion, that's great. I just think that helps fortify us, and that's not for them, that's for us. Right? That's for us to feel better and get through these family events.
So I would say those are internal responses. Those are the things I'm gonna tell myself if someone tells me something, but I can also so prepare some external responses. What am I going to say in response to someone giving me their negative feedback? I could say, I don't need your opinion on my body. I can say, thank you. I know where to come if I wanna discuss this further, but for now, I'd appreciate you not commenting on my body or my weight. I like that one the best, because that teaches them to not maybe do it to the next person.
We do not have control over other people at the end of the day, but we always have control over our response. And so what I've tried to give you today is just an understanding of why what someone else says might affect us, might trigger us, and an alternative way to think about it that is compassionate to them, but also really compassionate for us. Because if we can find the compassion to discount what they're saying, especially while we're working on building our own self-esteem from the inside, it can help us feel better to get through these family situations. So these tips, while it might help family not fight, It's really to help us get through a family event unscathed.
So I hope that this has been helpful. I hope, again, this has given you some tips to take the power back into your feelings about yourself and your reactions to other people's comments. I hope you found it insightful and I just wish you the best holiday season. Keep working on your own positive self-talk. It's the best way to get through these events. Until next time.